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Harriet watched in astonishment as Peanut the pig trotted at speed straight into the house. ‘A pet?’ Patrick shook his head. ‘She’s a house pig. Kathleen used to say she was much brighter and cleaner than any dog.’
Harriet followed Peanut’s eager path into the kitchen. With the pronounced aspect of a pig grateful to be reunited with the comforts of home, Peanut snuggled down on the old mat in front of the battered Aga and stretched out for a snooze. As astonished as a dog could be, Samson came out from below a chair with an aggressive flurry of warning barks. For all the world like another dog, Peanut rolled over playfully. Nonplussed, the chihuahua hovered, advancing and retreating while he got acquainted with the intruder. Finally they both pretended to go to sleep at opposite ends of the rug.
In no hurry to go home, Patrick accepted a cup of tea and with painstaking seriousness offered Harriet small helpful snippets of advice on animal husbandry. He also promised to bring round a book about chickens that had belonged to his mother.
Tolly took his leave only when the younger man did.
‘I’m thinking you’ve made a conquest there,’ Tolly remarked with an amused chuckle. ‘I’ve never heard that quiet young fella talk so much. He’s from a decent family, you know, and he has a tidy farm.’
Beneath the old man’s meaningful appraisal, Harriet went pink. ‘I’m not looking for a man, Tolly.’
‘But sure love might be looking for you, and you’ll hardly chase it away if it comes along.’ He took his leave with an irrepressible smile.
Love, Harriet thought glumly. A laugh that rang hollow in the cosy kitchen fell from her lips. She had spent a good part of her adult life in love with a man who had replaced her apparently without a moment’s thought or regret. Perhaps that lack of feeling and concern for her hurt most of all. Luke had grown out of their relationship and moved on. It was though she had been in love with a male who didn’t really exist, for the man she had loved would never have been so cruelly indifferent to her suffering. There had been no evidence that Luke had agonised at any stage over whether or not to succumb to her younger sister’s attractions.
Now Harriet found herself wondering if Luke had ever truly loved her. Or had she just been around for so long that she had become a habit in his life? Had he got bored with her? Had he felt trapped in their engagement? She remembered his unwillingness to name a day for their wedding and saw that reluctance in a new and humiliating light. It was possible that he had known for a long time that she might not be the one for him.
Fergal delivered Snowball, the elderly mare, who walked placidly into a vacant stall. Harriet saddled her up and took her for a ride. Snowball plodded down the back lane with an unshakeable good humour that was exactly right for Harriet’s rusty prowess on a horse.
*
While Harriet was enjoying getting acquainted with Snowball, Tolly was serving his unofficial employer with a pre-dinner drink and the calm forecast that Harriet Carmichael would be married within the year.
Rafael frowned at the old man, and then decided to be amused by that prediction. ‘Have you taken up reading crystal balls, Tolly?’
‘I don’t need to. Patrick Flanagan was making moony eyes at her, and the quiet ones are always the fastest movers when the right woman comes along,’ Tolly opined with conviction. ‘She’ll be spoilt for choice, though.’
‘Really?’ Rafael dealt him an encouraging glance. ‘The vultures are gathering, are they?’
‘Fergal Gibson would probably like to be in the running…but he’s got the mammy from hell, and she’d see off any girl who looked twice at her precious boy!’
‘Quite a handicap,’ Rafael conceded. ‘But I have it on the best of authority that Harriet is not interested in men right now.’
‘Sure, don’t women always say that to the wrong ‘uns until the right man comes along!’ Tolly scoffed, with a conviction that set his employer’s even white teeth on edge.
*
Ten days later, on the day before she was due to return from England to Ballyflynn, Harriet took stock of her situation.
Even before she’d left Ireland she had spent two days investigating the possibility of raising finance to pay off Kathleen’s loan, and had been daunted by her singular lack of success. She’d taken legal advice about her position from a lawyer based in Dublin and had learned nothing that comforted her. But she’d been delighted when her mother had phoned her, to say that she would be visiting London at the same time. Bolstered by that cheering prospect, because she had not seen her mother for several months, Harriet had felt energised enough to deal with the transport firm she had hired to transport her furniture to Ballyflynn, and finally to hand over the keys of her London apartment to her solicitor.
In fact she’d come to terms with the reality that she could not raise anything like the amount of money that she needed to exclude Rafael Flynn from his interest in her home and business.
That afternoon she made use of the phone number he had given her and called him. ‘Hello, this is Harriet Carmichael,’ she explained carefully.
A slow smile curved Rafael’s expressive mouth. Beyond the window a deep blue sky
framed the ancient terracotta tiled rooftops of Rome. His keen dark gaze had taken on a reflective light, for she sounded so very earnest on the phone. Indifferent to the board meeting that had stopped dead the instant he chose to answer his mobile, he murmured smoothly, ‘Harriet…how may I be of assistance?’
‘I have a question to ask. Will you settle for fifty per cent of the loan being repaid now and a reduced stake in the livery yard?’
‘No deal,’ Rafael said without hesitation.
‘Is any variation in the terms possible?’
‘No.’
Harriet was not surprised by his intransigence. After all, as far as the loan was concerned he held the aces. But if she chose to settle for the alternative option the odds would become much more equal, and she rather thought that that possibility had not occurred to him. Breathing in deep and lifting her chin, Harriet said brightly, ‘Then it’s a case of…Hello, partner…’
